The Wally Stevens Letters
by Goren R O
Summary: Goren correctly diagnosed Wally Stevens as having Asperger Syndrome. Eames suggested that Wally might benefit from having someone write to him in prison. So, Goren rose to the challenge.
1. Chapter 1

Wally - Hi.

Thanks for agreeing to correspond.

This letter will be brief, and I want you to destroy it as soon as you've read it. It's important that the other inmates don't realise you are exchanging letters with me. They wouldn't understand and might see it as a reason to victimise you. Prison life is very much about "us" and "them", remember that. You want to stay off their radar.

You must expect your letters to be read by prison staff, too.

So in future I want you to address me as William Lewis, and send your letters to me care of Lewis Classic Automotive, 517 E 73rd St NY.

Sorry for the subterfuge, but I have your safety in mind, as well as my own. Please destroy this letter now, don't delay.

Sincerely

Robert Goren

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Wally - thanks for your last. I guess it doesn't matter that you did tell one other inmate already, especially as the guy is on death row and most likely in solitary most of the time anyway. No, I don't know Mark Ford Brady. He was out of the picture before I joined my present place of employment.

"Alex" (she wants you to call her Alex in your letters, please) is delighted that you remembered her and asks you not to continue to fret over your exaggerated interest in what she was saying the last time you met her. I've given her a full and frank explanation of your condition and she now understands. Perfectly. Believe me.

That was bad, the theft of your Bible. Prison's a hard place Wally - you don't have privacy or security like you're used to when living on the outside. Please be careful. I've sent you another Bible (under separate cover) - it was mine in grade school but I don't need it any more.

Sincerely, William.

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Wally - thanks for your last letter.

Alex sends her regards. She apologises, but she doesn't think she'll be able to start corresponding with you as well; she's always very busy at work and with family matters. I know you'll understand. I'll keep her informed, tell her how you're doing.

Very pleased to hear Bible turned up safe. The new measures you have in place for safe storage sound good. Really, I don't need it any more. I can always get another if I change my mind.

No, I'm not having problems deciphering your handwriting; I only hope you can read mine. I'm not normally much of a social letter-writer. Touch typing wasn't a study subject on offer to me when I joined my present profession, as I am sure you can appreciate. Normally I ask my sister to type things for me, but these letters are private.

Sincerely, William.

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Hi Wally - thanks for your last -

Please find enclosed seven (#) xeroxed sheets - reproduction of recent article in Scientific American. It's about autism rather than Asperger Syndrome but I thought you might want to add it to your collection, anyway. I've highlighted one paragraph that I found especially illuminating.

Thank you, yes - Alex is very well. In fact, she told me she'll be having a baby in about 28 weeks' time. She'll be going on maternity leave from her place of work in about 24 weeks. I'm trying not to worry for her, because she hates it if I do that.

Yours, William.

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Wally - thanks for your last letter .

Hey, that's good news, that you can read my writing. Yes you're right. I'm left-handed. Very curious as to how you worked that out? I wish some of the people where I work were so understanding about my penmanship. Normally I prefer to work with forms that require NO WRITING, just boxes to check. So much faster, less room for misunderstandings or ambiguities. You know what I mean. I know you do.

Sorry to hear that the sudden changes to your daily timetable caused you such distress. Myself, I know I'd be driven half crazy by the monotony of prison routine and would be OK with any changes, but I appreciate that isn't the case for you. Try turning it round in your head, though - it could be an advantage for you, having such a high tolerance for repetition.

Enc. please find clipping from one of my sister's pregnancy magazines regarding breathing exercises and mental visualisation techniques that you can try using if you feel physically overwrought in that way again. You know, in lieu of a piano, I mean.

Destroy the magazine cutting when you have looked at it, please.

William.

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Wally - hello. Thanks for your last.

I appreciate it's sometimes hard for you to figure out what people are thinking and feeling just from looking at their faces. But you can learn how to do this, you can teach yourself. I know you'd already begun this process, on the 'outside'. Does the prison library have any books about body language or facial expression? Look in the fine arts section. There are some really good reference book on the human face and what it can do. I made enquiries - the prison has art classes. One book in particular caught my eye in Barnes and Noble - it's called "Facial Expressions: A Visual Reference for Artists" by Mark Simon. I bought a copy, actually. Even my sister looks at it, sometimes. Check it out.

That's good to hear that you might be able to have some kind of job whilst you're inside. The prison authorities would be stupid to ignore a man with your abilities. Have you ever seen a film called "The Shawshank Redemption"? Plus - the money you'll earn means you will be able to pay for stamps and materials for more letters. There are services available where you could ask to correspond with people other than just me. I mean, if you wanted to.

Are you keeping in touch with your children, Wally?

I was pleased to hear that the food where you are agrees with you so well. No, they cannot compel you to eat peas.

Regards, William.

ps Your calculations are right. Alex has left work now on maternity leave. I am waiting to hear how she is getting on.

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Wally

I'm arranging for a friend of mine to come and see you, to help get you a proper diagnosis of Asperger Syndrome, and to write you a reference for your getting a job inside Riker's. This might help make things easier for you. So, when you get a request for visiting from **DR. EMIL SKODA**, please agree to see him. He's a clinical psychologist. He is a man I like and trust.

May not be able to write for a couple weeks - really bad things happening at work. Sorry.

William.

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Wally - thanks for your letter. I'm well, thanks. I have someone new to work with. Like you, I don't like change very much. I know I said I hate routine, but change is the worst thing. It took me a long time to get used to things how they were, and now with someone new, it's very frustrating. I'm enclosing some information about a charitable program called "Books Behind Bars" which you might be able to look into in order to get some more books on the subject of facial expression and body language. My mother was a librarian. She's donated lots of books to this charity in the past.

I promise to tell you about Alex's baby as soon as I hear anything.

You didn't answer my question about keeping in touch with your children.

Write soon,

Your friend,

William.

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To Be Continued. I hope.


	2. Chapter 2

Dear Wally,

Hi there. It's been so long since I last wrote you, I feel I should almost begin my letter with "Dear Mr. Stevens, I don't know if you remember me, but - " or something. I'm not sure I have a really great excuse for not writing - after all, I made you a promise, and I don't like breaking promises. Don't like it at all. But in my own defence I will say that I've been pretty busy ever since I came to see you in person. Family stuff, you know. It had quite an impact on me, especially at work.

OK. Gotta go now, to get this in the mail before the weekend!

William.

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Wally -

Thanks for your letter. I'm glad you still want to keep in touch. And, thanks for your prayers. That means a lot to me, as a matter of fact. I don't know where I stand with God right now, it's good to know there is another advocate on my side.

Enough about me. How are you? Please find enclosed a book of puzzles called Sudoku - they're new - I think you might like them. Let me know.

Will.

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Hey, Wally -

Can you help me with a puzzle? I've been wrangling with it for a while now, but it's a bit like wrestling naked with a greasy hog, to be honest. You once said to me that there was no such thing as a coincidence, but I've got something that I can't explain any other way. You know, where I live, I'm pretty high up, and I can see a lot of the city from here. Sorry if that makes you feel reminiscent or sentimental or anything. Maybe it's unfair to talk about views of the outside to a man who will never see those views ever again in his life? Anyway, sometimes the view freaks me out a bit. I can see, if I put my mind (and my ex-service binoculars) to it, whole chapters of human activities playing out underneath me. But I can't really influence any of what I see. So, I got to wondering whether or not sometimes God feels that way too, you know, since giving human beings the blessing/curse of Free Will. God sees all, right? But he can't intervene much. Or, he doesn't.

Not like in Old Testament times. Used to be all up in people's faces then. Made things a lot more straightforward. You're a man of faith Wally. Why is God so much QUIETER these days, huh?

Yours thoughtfully, William.

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Wally.

Hey, I really like your comparison of people in the Old Testament as being like the children, the childhood, of humanity. And nowadays we're a bit more grown up. Don't need the adult supervision to such a degree, is that it? I can imagine the God of the Old Testament being like a real pater familias. Like a tyrant father, with difficult children. So he was always having to intervene, lay down the law, wade in to break up fighting siblings, right?

Is your father still alive? What was he like when you were a kid?

William

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Wally -

Thanks for your frank reply. No, I'm not a father. Opportunities came and went, but I didn't want the commitment, the responsibility. My dad was not a good role model. I'm not so confident that I'd be any good at the task, you know? Plus there's a history of illnesses on my mother's side of the family, which is worrying.

Have your sons been tested for Asperger's yet? It's carried down the male side of the family line. Have you had any contact at all with their mom?

William.

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Dear Wally -

You're right. I never finished talking about my 'puzzle' - the one about coincidences. I know you say that there is ALWAYS a pattern - however small and seemingly insignificant. That's why there are no coincidences. But where do you draw the line for that? Sure, there are always discernible patterns in the activity of any individual person, but how do you explain connections and patterns that seem to occur over a much much wider scale?

Hope you can read my writing, I've had a couple of drinks tonight.

See, it seems NOT a coincidence that you were placed in solitary, just two cells down from ... "someone". Someone who then used you to get to me (you remember who I am talking about, don't you? But I don't want to use his name, don't want that identification in our letters, see?) How did that sequence of events happen to be a coincidence?

As I get older, the more of life's shit I see, the more reasons I find not to believe in God, but sometimes I feel like my life is some kind of book, or a play, and there is someone or something out there that is writing it all down, word by word, situation by situation. I mean, how could there be that random coincidence that "someone" was there, and he knew you were in contact with me, and he used that knowledge to change so many things for me? I can't work that out. There's no explanation for how such a complicated set of circumstances could have come to be, out of random-ness.

So I guess I have to believe in God again, right?

William.

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